A LEGAL battle is brewing between Secretary of Education, Research and Technology Zorisha Hackett and PNM Tobago Council political leader Ancil Dennis over alleged defamatory remarks made by the latter in relation to the THA’s tertiary student support programme.

Dennis posted the comments on social media on February 5.

Attorney Marion Ingrid Melville, who is representing Hackett, issued a six-page pre-action protocol letter to Dennis at his Plymouth home, on February 12.

Describing his statements as “untrue, malicious and reckless,” Melville has requested that Dennis retract his statements and apologise publicly to Hackett within seven days of the receipt of the letter.

“However, should you fail to retract, apologise and cause the publication of a public apology no later than seven days from the day hereof, our client will further demand that you make a statement in court and accordingly will commence legal proceedings in the High Court against you, including proceedings for such interim relief as may be advised,” she wrote.

Melville also has asked that Dennis “not repeat the statements or similar statements about our client for the injury of her reputation and the considerable distress and the embarrassment that she has suffered and continues to suffer.”

In his post on February 5, Dennis claimed he had received “numerous calls and pleas from university students and some parents nervously awaiting tertiary education support from the THA.”

He further claimed that over 100 university students from Tobago have been awaiting support from the THA for almost a year, “for as little as $25,000 in some cases, some on the verge of being thrown out of universities across the Caribbean, others wondering how they will meet their real and necessary living expenses outside of Tobago.”

He also queried the THA's support of a particular student's studies at a foreign university.

Dennis said, “This secretary has travelled the globe at tax-payers expense on several unnecessary and wasteful trips and their overall travel bill is perhaps $20 million by now.”

Dennis continued, “This high level of disregard and callousness meted out to Tobagonian university students is highly unacceptable and I am calling on the THA to get their priorities in order…”

In her letter, Melville told Dennis that “attached to your post (on February 5), you uploaded a clip of a video recording of an interview done by our client on Tobago Updates on January 27, 2025.”

She added, “The statements which you made and published attribute to our client and are understood to mean, that our client, as secretary of DERTech, is acting improperly, negligently, irresponsibly and is failing to execute her duty of care to tertiary education students from Tobago who apply for and require financial support.

“In the natural and ordinary meaning, the words signify and are understood to mean that the interview done by Ms Hackett on 27th day of January 2025 on Tobago Updates was an excuse for an alleged failure by the THA to provide tertiary education sup